


A Little Much

by loudspeakr



Series: Melodrama [1]
Category: Rhett & Link
Genre: Angst, Ficlet, Infidelity, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-26
Updated: 2017-03-26
Packaged: 2018-10-10 23:05:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10449582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loudspeakr/pseuds/loudspeakr
Summary: Rhett takes stock of where he stands.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know. I was listening to the song in the car, and just. Ugh. Drabble happened.
> 
> Inspired by Lorde's [_Liability_](https://open.spotify.com/track/0xBsZrUrsZcCCrpxryZDHc).

Rhett has never been one to hold onto things. It’s not that he isn’t sentimental – he is. Just take a look at the spare room in his home, the room he likes to call his ‘man cave’ where he houses his most precious possessions until they can have a whole building of their own.

And it definitely isn’t that he lacks any kind of emotional attachment. Also not true. He could give you a hundred stories from his days as a young bachelor that beg to differ, stories filled with embarrassing details he would rather not live through again.

All it is – and it’s simple, really – is that he understands that, when something is over, it’s _over_.

Grudges? None of those. He could give that guy a hug now – the one from the gym that ruined his wife’s Valentine’s gift a few years back – and not want to squeeze the living daylights out of him.

Past disappointments? Losing _Commercial Kings_ had been a blessing in disguise, and so were all of the TV pilots that were written in the sleepy hours of the morning, half-delirious and half-desperate, slumped in their tiny Fuquay office.

Lovers? Okay – he’s guilty of crying over a few ringing phone lines and getting lost in several bottles of cheap whiskey all because of a girl who realised, quite rightly, that they were not suited for one another. But then, after the mourning was done, he would pick himself up by the boot straps and move on.

No lingering. No pining. No keeping scores, counting up losses and wins. None of that.

But that’s all pretty cut and dry. Truth is, it can get more complicated than that. It _has_ gotten more complicated than that.

For example –

Jessie is a win. No question about it. She’s everything he needs: comforting, funny, warm, too smart for his own good. She puts up with a lot, that woman, and more than that? She _supports_ him. She gives him enough slack on the rope for him to do his own thing, and in return, he lets her rein him back in when he’s gone too far.

He doesn’t regret the path he took that led him straight to Jessie. No, never.

A loss, however?

There’s not much in that department, nothing that really justifies a second thought.

Well, maybe there’s one thing, one person that comes to mind – but it doesn’t count. It _can’t_ count. Not as a loss. Not when he reaps the benefits every day. Not when he gives so little and gets so much in return. Not when he’s tried to shake it off, and it just won’t let go.

It isn’t a loss when he feels the gravity of what he’s doing – of what they’re doing – _everywhere_ , no matter how late it is at night or how many paces he’s taken back and forth in their office.

But then it sinks its claws into his chest. It rises like bile in his throat, spills like salted tears over his cheeks at the end of the day when he watches him go back to her, sees him choose _her_ over and over again despite the fingerprints so carelessly left on his skin.

God, when it hurts like this, it sure does feel like something has been lost. Like he’s been losing for the past thirty-four years and counting.

But you know what? That’s okay. Because Rhett isn’t keeping track.

And besides, you can’t hold onto something you never had.

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry. I had to.


End file.
